


Closure

by jedicallie (writergirlie)



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-05-29
Updated: 2010-05-29
Packaged: 2017-10-09 19:08:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,840
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/90576
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/writergirlie/pseuds/jedicallie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Luke seeks closure after his encounter with Abeloth (contains spoilers for <i>Allies</i>, sequel to "Darkness Falls")</p>
            </blockquote>





	Closure

**Author's Note:**

> As the title suggests, I guess I needed some extra closure too :). It's difficult saying goodbye to a character you love--almost like losing a friend. This is a sequel to my other story, "Darkness Falls," and I recommend you read that first before reading this one (otherwise, Callie's last line won't make any sense).
> 
> Special thanks to Barbara Hambly, from whom the beautiful song in the opening comes. It appeared in _Planet of Twlight,_ when Luke is recalling a song that Aunt Beru used to sing to him.
> 
> Oh and if any of you happen to be fans of a similarly star-crossed couple who never got a chance for the long haul, Simon &amp; Katie from _As the World Turns_, you may recognize a line or two in here :). My way of paying tribute to them as well.

_Through dying suns and midnights grim_

_And treachery, and faith gone dim,_

_Whatever dark the world may send,_

_Still lovers meet at journey’s end._

_\-- _Tatooine folk song

 

 

Luke Skywalker wasn’t even sure whether this would work.

 

It had been difficult enough the first time—nearly impossible—and that he and Ben had managed it then was nothing short of a miraculous feat already, but he had to try again. With every fiber of his being, he knew he would not be able to go on without the knowledge that he hadn’t at least tried.

 

The mist that surrounded him dimmed what light there was to begin with. It swirled around him, brushing past him, like tentative touches—the voices of those trying to reach him but falling short of their prize. But there was only one whose voice he desperately needed to hear. Only one whose image, whose face, whose body he needed to see.

 

Whose hand he needed to touch one last time to bring to close this long, arduous journey onto which he’d first embarked over three decades ago now. Perhaps somewhere inside of him, in the part that had held onto hope in the deepest recesses of his heart, he hadn’t wanted to see it come to an end. But he knew now that unless it did, he would forever walk in this special form of purgatory.

 

His eyes scanned around, hungry for a hint of movement, a glimmer of a shape. And then it came, materializing in the distance, an amorphous form that grew ever more solid as he approached it, and his heart thundered against his ribcage when he finally got close enough to see.

 

“Callista…”

 

She smiled, that warm, gentle smile that he had never forgotten, gray eyes suffused with light that he saw all too little in their time together. She stepped forward, her heavy lightsaber swinging at her hip.

 

“I knew you’d come,” she said. The words were nearly the same as what he’d heard in the cave, but he felt none of the dread, none of the shock that had seized his body then—only overwhelming joy, one he hadn’t felt in the time since he watched her walk away from him. “I knew you’d find a way.”

 

“Is it really you?”

 

She nodded. “It’s really me this time, love. No tricks.”

 

He felt wetness on his cheeks. Tears had pooled in his eyes and were coming down of their own volition. He couldn’t have stopped them even if he wanted. And he didn’t want to.

 

She reached out a hand and he hesitated, afraid she’d vanish if he took another step, afraid that fate didn’t truly allow for such things, for it had already taken so many things from them.

 

_If I could ask for only one thing, one thing in my entire life…_

 

“Luke…”

 

She came forward--slowly, as though knowing he would need the time, and only when he felt her breath on his face, took in the warm sea scent of her hair did he finally let the last crumbling vestiges of his guard down and take her in his arms, kissing her and breathing her in, remembering what it was like to hold her like this, remembering what it was to lose her.

 

Remembering what it had been like to know that his soul had found its other half.

 

Her hand came up to cradle his cheek, her thumb absently running along his scar, and she leaned into him, forehead touching his.

 

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m sorry you had such a hard road. That it… ended the way it did.”

 

He felt her shake her head, felt her ease off to look him in the eyes again.

 

“I’m the one who chose it. I’m the one who’s sorry.” She drew in breath, then broke the gaze, her voice low and defeated when she went on. “I thought I was doing the noble thing. That we’d both be better off if I…” She shook her head again, and turned it to the side, her eyes looking into the distance, as though specters of the past were playing out for her in the mists. Haunting her.

 

After some time, she turned to look at him once more.

 

“The worst part was hurting you. Letting you think that I chose the Force over you. That I… loved it more than I loved you.”

 

Tears fell from her eyes. Luke brought up his hands to cup her cheeks and fanned at the corners of her eyes to catch the wetness.

 

“I didn’t,” she said, her voice barely a whisper. “I don’t. I would have learned to live with the silence of it in time, but…”

 

“But we didn’t have it. We didn’t have that time.”

 

He didn’t know where to aim his anger—whether it was the universe or the Force, or time or fate or all of it—but he felt it surge up within him, burn in his lungs where it turned into regret. Bitterness. He closed his eyes and forced it to dissipate until it changed into sadness. Just an intense sadness.

 

For what could have been. For what should have been.

 

“Were you happy?” she said. “Have you had a good life?”

 

He opened his eyes once more to look at her, take in the shape of her face, the contours of her smile. It was a difficult question for him to answer, far more difficult than he thought it would be. And at once he thought back to a similar question he had asked her, long ago in the forgotten corridors of the _Eye_, when he had wondered aloud whether she’d been happy on her home world of Chad.

 

_I think more happy than I’ve ever been since…_

 

Her answer had confounded him then—puzzled him, for he hadn’t understood what it was to have a home, one that hurt to leave, one that haunted his dreams. But he understood it now.

 

Because his home had been with her.

 

“I’ve been blessed with a lot of things. Family. Friends.”

 

“Love?”

 

He smiled, understanding that it was difficult for her to ask the question, just as it had pained him to think of her life before him, the time when Geith had been the one in her heart.

 

“Yes,” he said softly. “Yes, that too. But different. Not like this.” He reached up to brush away a lock of hair from her forehead and tuck it behind her ear. “Not like this…”

 

“Your son... He’s beautiful. Strong in the Force. I’m so happy you got to have him. That you have the family you always wanted.”

 

He nodded. There was a time when he would have given anything to have had that child with her. For Ben to have been a child that she had borne. They had made so many plans that never came to fruition, and his heart ached at the children who never had the chance to come into being, the life they never got to have.

 

The mists began to grow thicker, the air cooler. Callista stepped back and looked around, her eyes suddenly growing sad before she looked at him again.

 

“It’s time,” she said softly. “I’ve got to go.”

 

“No you don’t,” he said, fingers closing over her wrists. “You’ve only just got here…”

 

_I only just got you back…_

 

She gently eased out of his hold and brought her hands up to his face. “I can’t stay… I would if I could, but… that’s not the way of the Force.”

 

_Then damn the Force._

 

“Yes, you can… It’s my dream—what I say goes…”

 

She shook her head and smiled, the same wistful smile she gave him when he had told her he’d asked Cray to create an android body for her, to extract the essence of her from the Will and save her in any form Cray could. She was right then and she was right now.

 

He just didn’t want to hear it said it out loud.

 

“Luke, you know it doesn’t work that way.”

 

He shut his eyes to keep the tears from spilling, but they leaked through anyway, stinging his eyes, stinging his face. Flowing as though there would never be an end to them.

 

“If you were just going to leave me like this,” he said, “then why did you bother coming back in the first place?”

 

It wasn’t a fair question and he knew so. It was he who had come here seeking her, seeking closure that he so desperately wanted. That he so desperately needed. He felt her tilt his face up and slowly, painfully, he wrenched his eyes open, knowing what the answer had to be, and knowing that nothing could ever make it easier for him to accept it.

 

“Listen to me,” she said. “Please, just listen… I love you. I should have told you so more often—told you every chance I got. There will never be enough time for me to tell you everything that needs to be said. But time is long, and we will meet again, I promise.”

 

“I’m not ready to let go. Not yet.”

 

“I know… I know… But you have to. Your time here isn’t finished yet. You’ve got so much more left of your road.”

 

_I’ve already had to walk so much of it alone… How do I bring myself to walk it alone once more?_

 

“I’ll always be with you,” she whispered. He should have known that she’d read his thought. “Always.”

 

And he knew it to be true. She, who was at last one with the Force, which had abandoned her for so long but finally beckoned her home, would be with him every time he called on its life energy, felt that surge coursing through his veins.

 

He looked up, seeing the edges of her form already begin to shimmer as she slipped away from him. One last time, he brought his hand up to her cheek, wanting to feel the warmth of her flesh for as long as humanly possible.

 

“Goodbye, my love,” she said. “Thank you for bringing me back this far. I’m so very, very sorry I failed us.”

 

“Callista-”

 

“Luke…” Her voice grew fainter, her face fading fast before his eyes. “Luke, you need to know…”

 

“Callie…”

 

“There is… another…”

 

And just like that, she was gone. The air in his lungs pressed painfully against his ribcage, until slowly, he let it go.

 

He let go.

 

Mist drew near him again, moving over the spot where she had stood, vapor where flesh had been. Her final words resonated in his ears, in his head, but he couldn’t think about them now. There would be time for that, later. For now, he just needed to breathe. Just needed to stand here and feel the echo of her presence, let it penetrate his pores until he was ready to walk away once more.

 

_Goodbye, my love… Until we meet again…_

 

For now, he had his closure.


End file.
